


Douse the Lantern

by penitence_road



Category: Yoroiden Samurai Troopers | Ronin Warriors
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dark, Gen, Pre-Series, Roleswap
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-23
Updated: 2015-12-23
Packaged: 2018-05-08 18:27:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,229
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5508230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/penitence_road/pseuds/penitence_road
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After a rebellion in the Netherworld, two of Talpa's warlords are sent to clean up the remainder.  Ronin Roleswap AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Douse the Lantern

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ryuutchi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ryuutchi/gifts).



The army sallied from the Silver Wall had fallen a week ago. A priest had delivered the order, just a priest—Talpa was far, far away—but the words had raised a hum of sympathetic vibration in his armor all the same.

_Hunt them down, my warlords. No survivors._

Yama waved a contingent of soldiers to a stop as they crested the hill. Below them, the bare soil gave way to sand and dry stalks of knee-high grass that whispered like old regrets at the faintest breeze; beyond lay the sea, a rippling black cloth stretching to the horizon. A single light wove down the shoreline, an orange torch-flame struggling against the pressing, cloud-cloaked night. A dark-shouldered mass trailed out behind it like the swish of a forlorn beast's tail.

“Douse the lantern,” Yama ordered under his breath. As the soldier behind him closed one armored hand around the papercraft lantern, crushing it to banish the ghostly flame within, he pulled off his helmet and scanned the water.

Nothing. Not that he was expecting a herald of green fluorescence—Neptune in his element had no need of the light—but with no moon, not even any stars, it did make coordination a pain in the ass.

Yama dismounted, took a few steps away from the horses, and knelt down to slide his hands through the grass, seeking the earth below. He closed his eyes for what little difference it would make, and extended his senses through his element.

Six horses behind him, and the thrum of the Nether Realm's energies everywhere, a pale underlay extending thin tendrils through the animals, the soldiers, the grass—everything native to the place. Below, nine sets of feet trudged over the sand—one was limping, their steps intertwined with another's. With a surge of distaste, Yama pushed his mind further, beneath the cycling skim of waves across the shore. A low burn rose as he pressed his awareness outward, his element turning rebellious and cold, but there, right at the edges of his range...

Quick as the flash of a scale, Neptune's awareness brushed his and drew away, leaving a sense of confirmation in his mind like a patina of breath on chilled glass.

Yama opened his eyes and looked back down on the refugees' torch, closing one hand into a fist on the ground. Just beyond his knuckles, a ridge of stone lifted from the earth and pulled away, rising and rising. A tremor raced away before it, and down at the shore, the footsteps stumbled to a halt. Two voices calling out became four, became a muddled din, faint beneath the bellow of living stone. A contracting crescent of rock lifted around the group below, and their steps fell to disarray, backed into the edges of the surf. One bright idiot tried to climb the wall—Yama felt the scrabbling grasp of fingers, and huffed annoyance. A new pillar caught the man squarely in the midsection, throwing him out and off with a distant splash.

The border of land and sea rose and receded in his mind, but he kept pushing until he felt the last pair of feet stagger into the water. And there—the most distant weight vanished abruptly, torn away from the floor of the sea. A sharp cry, cut off into a gurgle. Another went, and another...

Yama stood up again, lifting his eyes to the water. The lone flame swung in desperate arcs, illuminating flashes of terror-bright eyes and water thrashed white and turgid around struggling limbs. No screaming, now, just the hopeless jumble of splashing.

The man with the torch looked out, at the last moment, his eyes sweeping over the darkness and catching on the figures on the slope. Despair seized his features into pinched lines; his voice rose in the dark.

“Damn you! _Damn_ you!”

Then the torch wheeled back and guttered, swallowed by the black water, leaving only the sound of the waves gradually returning to their normal ebb.

“Get another light up.” Yama crossed his arms, staring into the night as the soldiers behind him moved again, the sound of hollow armor clanking and echoing in the wind. It had grown colder, or was that just him imagining things?

He heard the movement from below before he saw it, an even tread pacing up towards them. As a new flicker of greenish-white illumination spilled over the grass, it caught on the edges of Neptune's armor, tinting it with pale jade. They met at the cusp of the light.

“It's done?”

“It's done,” Neptune confirmed, head dropping in a brief nod. His eyes met Yama's and considered him for a moment, after which he added. “And that should be the last of it, for now.”

Yama rolled his eyes. “I didn't ask,” he responded sourly.

“No, but you're in a mood.” Neptune turned his attention up to the soldiers, raising his voice. “Leave two of the horses and go. We'll catch up.”

The soldiers obeyed without protest; Yama turned to watch them disappear, one by one, back over the edge of the hill. “Why did you do that?” he asked, as the last of them tied the lantern to the saddle of Yama's horse and followed the others. “It's not like I want to have some kind of heart-to-heart with you.”

Neptune shrugged, his armor dissolving in a flutter of white petals that the wind picked up and carried towards the sea. “I don't want to ride all the way back to the capital listening to you brood. You don't like this work; it's done. So lighten up.”

“It's done until the next time someone's stupid enough to pick a fight with Lord Talpa,” Yama cut back in retort.

“That's happening less and less.” The other warlord took another few steps up the slope, stopping just above Yama's level, and turned to look back down at him. Eyes thoughtful, Neptune pushed one hand through his hair. “Regretting your choice, Yama?”

The question was quiet—dangerously so, for a whole host of reasons. Yama's mouth tightened.

“You said it yourself—I just don't like this cleaning-up. It's tedious. There's no fight in it.”

“There'll be another fight the next time someone's stupid enough to pick a fight with Lord Talpa.” Neptune smiled a bit with the words. Yama stared at him for a moment, then heaved a sigh.

“Yeah, I guess there will. Think it'll be any better than the last one?” Sakura petals brushed his face and skimmed away like sand as he relaxed the little knot of concentration in his mind that kept his armor materialized.

“I think so. Every time this happens, it tells the next group they'll need to plan better, have more resources to throw at us.”

“Mm. Well, they'd better find some good ones.”

Neptune hummed agreement, gaze lifting upward. “Why don't we take the long way back?” he proposed after a moment of thought. “We can give our report to the priest, then go hunt something big enough to put up a good fight in the Sea of Pines.”

Yama smirked. “I like it when your attitude puts food in my stomach.”

“Well, like I said, I do hate having to put up with you brooding.” Neptune grinned.

They headed back up towards the horses, leaving the wind to whisper its empty promises to the sea.

 

**Author's Note:**

> A short secondary gift for Ryuutchi. I had such big plans for this scenario, but it was turning more Dais-centric than a Kento story had any business being, so I decided to just take a look at what Kento and Cye's lives and personalities might have looked like in the day-to-day horror of being a servitor of Talpa. I imagine this as being set about halfway between their being taken from Japan and their return to it. I hope you enjoy it, despite its only tangential resemblance to the series it's based on.


End file.
